RENEWABLE ENERGY NEWSLETTER
February 2005Issue 3
Editorial
1
News – PV vision report
3
Poland:
High potential for RES
5
Conference Reports
7
- Media event in Uppsala
7
- Wind Energy in London
7
- Information day for proposers
7
- Bio-energy workshop in Russia
8
- Renewable energy in Denver
8
- EU and China biofuels workshop
8
Spotlight on Biofuels
9
- Biofuels on the road
9
- The biorefinery concept
12
Technology Focus – Results
14
FP6 Projects Status
15
Future Events
16
Spotlight on biofuels
Community research
E U R O P E A N
COMMISSION
RENEWS
CONTENTS
This, the third issue of the RENEWS Renewable Energy Newsletter,
takes as its theme ‘Biomass research in Europe’. Biomass in its
many forms and applications is already our main renewable
resource of energy but it still has an enormous, untapped potential.
We have chosen to focus on two of the most promising avenues
of research in which we are currently engaged, namely biofuels
and the bio-refinery concept.
Biofuels are already beginning to be used in commercial quantities,
notably for transport, where the Commission’s Liquid Biofuels
Directive has set ambitious targets rising from 2% this year to
5.75% of biofuels for transport by the year 2010. The bio-refinery
concept has great potential as an efficient and cost-effective way
to process biomass into biofuels, combined with the manufacture
of high added-value materials and chemicals, and other forms
of energy such as heat and electricity. Bio-refinery is only now
beginning to move from the conceptual phase through to the
inception of the first EC projects to research into the process
technologies, and their system integration. This wide-ranging
concept brings a significant multi-disciplinary dimension to the
research, and requires the close involvement and collaboration
of researchers and industry, from SMEs to multinationals.
As I write this, we are already engaged in preliminary preparations
for the seventh Framework Programme. Even at this early stage,
a place is foreseen for research into both biofuels and